A worker takes his lunch break from the job of repairing the beach public access walkway damaged by Hurricane Sandy in Harvey Cedars.

(Brian Donohue/The Star-Ledger)

HARVEY CEDARS — In 2011, a jury agreed Harvey and Phyllis Karan should be awarded an eye-popping $375,000 in exchange for losing their ocean view to a 22-foot-high sand dune built in front of their Harvey Cedars house.

Today, the couple agreed to accept a mere $1 — ending a landmark case that highlighted the emotionally-charged fight over efforts to build barriers to protect the Jersey Shore from future storms.

The Karans, whose original $375,000 jury award was thrown out by the state Supreme Court in July, were ready to end their five-year legal saga, said Peter Wegener, the Karans’ attorney.

The couple’s advanced ages — Harvey Karan is 82 and his wife is 77 — prompted them to settle, he said.

"They’re exhausted by the protracted litigation," Wegener said. "They just want to go on with their lives in peace."

As the Karans bowed out of the fight, Gov. Chris Christie put Shore residents on notice that the state is stepping up efforts to get reluctant homeowners’ permission to build dunes in areas hit hard by Hurricane Sandy.

Christie signed an executive order directing acting state Attorney General John Hoffman to start legal action to acquire the more than 1,000 easements needed to build dunes. The same order also created an office within the state Department of Environmental Protection to oversee the acquisition of the easements.

"We can no longer be held back from completing these critical projects by a small number of owners who are selfishly concerned about their view while putting large swaths of homes and businesses around them at risk," Christie said.

The Karans’ case began in 2008, when Harvey Cedars built a dune in front of the couple’s $1.9 million oceanfront house. The town offered the homeowners $300 for the strip of land needed for the dune.

The couple took legal action, arguing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers project not only wrecked their view, but lowered the value of their house. Earlier this year, a panel of appellate judges upheld the jury’s $375,000 award to the Karans.

But the state Supreme Court disagreed, invalidated the award and sent the case back for a new trial.

Harvey Cedars Mayor Jonathan Oldham said Karans decision to settle for $1 sends a message to easement holdouts that Shore protection is of utmost importance in these cases.

"This is good for the rest of the island and it’s good for New Jersey and it’s good for Harvey Cedars as well," Oldham said. "It certainly verifies that our position was right all along."

Oldham said the prospect of another trial, with the damages from Hurricane Sandy still so fresh in potential jurors’ minds, may have prompted the Karans to agree to far less than the $300 the town initially offered them.

Wegener, the Karans’ attorney, said he was confident a jury could have put aside images of Sandy and determined a fair value for the loss of the couple’s view. But he said his clients did not want another trial after some politicians portrayed the Karans as greedy residents, instead of homeowners who merely wanted to protect their right to fair compensation.

"There were a number of politicians who made absolutely outrageous comments about them, attempting to vilify them," Wegener said. "The whole attempt of the government is to browbeat anyone who exercises their constitutional right to just compensation."

Local and state leaders hailed the end of the Karans’ case as another step toward better protected shorelines.

"The Supreme Court has changed the law significantly — and appropriately — so that windfalls at the public’s expense may be avoided," said Christopher Porrino, director of the state Division of Law, who argued the matter before the Supreme Court. "Looking ahead, we expect that other beachfront property owners will recognize this reality, and will take their cue from the outcome in this case."